CALUMET — For a couple of weeks, there had been a buzz surrounding the Kingsford Flivvers at the Calumet Copper Kings volleyball game. The TV6 U.P volleyball poll ranked Kingsford #1 and Calumet #3 (Manistique #2). The game lived up to the hype. The intensity, atmosphere, and quality play displayed by both teams were everything, and more the passionate fan bases could have hoped to see. Every set went down to the wire, and Calumet took the game in four sets. Set one went the Flivvers’ way, 25-19. The Kings won the next three; 25-21, 26-24, 25-19.

“In the first set, I felt like we were jittery, making unforced errors, and then playing balls that were going out of bounds, essentially giving them points,” said Calumet head coach Kate Bonacorsi. “Then I thought we just showed a lot of resilience; it’s tough playing in a close match when Kingsford just kept chipping away and trying to find ways to score,” Bonacorsi added. Kingsford is a very good team. It was a ton of fun to have a close exciting match with lots of people in the gym watching.”

The Flivvers gave the home team everything they could handle, and Kingsford head coach Jaclynn Kreider was pleased with her team’s play.

“I think there were a lot of great things that we did right,” she said. “I feel like our serve receive early on was fantastic. We haven’t really had to make a lot of adjustments on the fly like we did tonight, and the girls did a good job with that,” Kreider explained. “We’d love to come out on the other side of this, but we are not going to hang our heads because that was a great team we lost to, and we hung in there.

The word must have gotten out in the school that Kingsford was ranked higher than Calumet because the Kings student section showed up in full force, body paint and all.

“I think it was a great atmosphere,” said Kreider. “I love watching a volleyball game against two really good teams and having a full gym. It’s good to see that volleyball is a sport in which people want to come and watch.”

Kreider was pleased with how the Calumet fans treated the Flivvers.

“The fans that Calumet brought here today created a great atmosphere, and they were super respectful to our girls, so it was a good atmosphere for us to play in.”

Maddie Kreider led the Flivvers with 13 kills and 15 assists, and Alyssa Larson scored eight times and assisted on 15 points. Bryonna Sanders had 26 digs and two aces. Both Ellery Nash and Jenna Viau had two aces. Anna Bortolini and Kailey Sundquist chipped in with six kills each.

Like Kingsford, Calumet had several players put up solid numbers.

The Kings had two players with double-digit kills: Allison Bjorn ended with 14, and Caitlyn Strom had 12. Madelyn Torola and Sienna Anderson added nine. Bjorn hit a service ace three times, and Torola and Anderson followed with a pair. Laina Kariniemi produced a huge number, 42 set assists.